Springing the Trap

[Note the Update below.]

Capitalizing on the still-expanding Foley scandal may very well carry grave risks that the Democrats -- all too typically -- seem to be blissfully and stupendously ignorant about. Foley acted terribly, and in ways that were potentially deeply damaging to the young people involved. Foley and the Republican leadership must certainly be held responsible for their malfeasance. That is fine, and admirable and necessary. But it is not fine to continue to ignore the other, ultimately much more monumental issues that have been staring us all in the face for years.

In the course of a discussion about Frist's foot-in-mouth pronouncement about "bring[ing] the Taliban and their supporters into the Afghan government" (a statement Frist is now scrambling to back away from) -- and after tying the Frist episode to the larger efforts to tamp down the violent instability wracking Afghanistan -- Billmon makes this critical connection, which I had missed:

Either way, I think we can take a guess at the larger motive: To shore up (or at least simmer down) the Afghanistan front in advance of the attack on Iran.

It seems utterly futile to me to keep making the following point, since I am convinced that not a single Democrat in Washington -- and only a few liberal and progressive bloggers -- appear to be willing to acknowledge or grapple with this issue. (Does that sound angry? You bet your ass.)

I said it here, in mid-June:

Given the depths of the irrationality repeatedly demonstrated by the Bush administration, it is impossible to predict what they will do with regard to Iran, or anything else. But here is one prediction that I offer nonetheless: if, come September or early October, Bush's political advisors think it likely that the Democrats will take over the House and/or the Senate, and if they seriously fear the investigations that the Democrats might pursue, I think it very likely that an attack on Iran will occur before the election. It may be preceded by a phony international "incident" of some kind involving an attack on U.S. forces or U.S. "interests" more generally, and responsibility will quickly be laid at Iran's door. Or, it might be another terrorist attack here in the U.S. itself.

Will our servile media or any prominent politician challenge the propaganda in the atmosphere of hysteria and phony "patriotism" that will be immediately unleashed? Of course not. The Bush administration has been laying the groundwork, carefully, repeatedly, and without interruption, for almost a year, and they have been met with no significant opposition at all.

Enjoy your summer. Come the fall, the bombs and missiles may well start flying.

As I discussed in detail the other day, just as in the case of the long leadup to passage of the Military Commissions Act, the Democrats have nothing to say about Iran except to echo the administration line that a potentially nuclear Iran -- lying four to five years in the future, or even further -- is "unacceptable" and "intolerable."

If the fallout from the Foley scandal makes it appear inevitable that the Democrats will take the House, the Iran card may be the surest one, and perhaps the only one, that the Bush administration has left to play. I am certain that the sons of bitches who call the shots in the administration have no intention of letting some annoying, whining pipsqueaks (as they undoubtedly view them) peer over their shoulders during the last two years of their reign, as they attempt to ensure American and Republican domination of this country and the world for the foreseeable future.

In the hysteria that would follow an attack on Iran, and in the ensuing, spreading carnage, enough people may well rally to the support of the administration to prevent the Democrats from making the required gains.

Have the Democrats been consistently and repeatedly speaking out in opposition to the administration's plans to bomb Iran, possibly even using nuclear weapons? No. Have the Democrats been building public opposition to such a criminal course of action? No. Have the Democrats been opposing the administration's plans in any meaningful way at all -- even though those plans have been absolutely clear for at least a year? No.

The trap has been laid. The time is rapidly approaching for it to be sprung.

And not one person of any national prominence has even a single word of significant opposition to offer. Not one.

God help us -- and God grant that this catastrophe does not befall us between now and November. He will have to help us -- because we surely will not help ourselves.

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I have been writing about the inevitability of an attack on Iran for a long time. Here are some related essays:

Our Date with Armageddon

A "Redeemer Nation," With Some Explaining to Do

Folly Marches On -- and Seeking a New Direction

Messianic Zealotry as Foreign Policy -- "Our Children Will Sing Great Songs..." (with links to still more essays on Iran, and about the general ideological principles underlying our foreign policy)

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UPDATE: Also relevant:

20,000 Sailors Go To War - Massive US and Allied Naval Deployment:

Bottom line is that there will be two carrier strike groups in the Gulf for late October and through November capable of starting World War III if Bush wants it bad enough.

Going to War to Save His Own Ass?:

We need only note how Bush, in his address at the UN General Assembly last week, was careful to describe the leaders of Iran as "supporters of terror." Be warned: this was a deliberately chosen linguistic construct which means he is asserting his right to attack them as part of that phony "war" on terror, based upon the long-outdated and grossly misrepresented 2001 AUMF.

Unless the American people and their ostensible representatives in Congress act quickly to make it clear that the 2001 AUMF does not apply to an attack on Iran, and that it did not make the president a dictator with the power to make war at will, I'm betting that we'll be at war with Iran before Election Day.

Let's be clear. This has nothing to do with a threat to America. Even by the most generous of interpretations of administration-hyped "evidence" about Iran's alleged nuclear weapons development efforts, Iran could not have a nuclear weapon for four years or more, with some estimates saying ten to 15 years. That's plenty of time to mount a successful diplomatic campaign to block it.